A Musical About Slobodan Milosevic Stirs Memories in Kosovo

The musical “Lift: The Slobodan Show,” by a Serbian theater group, premiered in the Serbian-majority town of Gracanica, Kosovo, on Tuesday.Credit
Hazir Reka/Reuters

The Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic died during his trial for war crimes at The Hague in 2006. So his reincarnation in a glossy tracksuit for an experimental Serbian musical this week in Kosovo has provoked complicated feelings in the majority Albanian country.

“The Lift: The Slobodan Show” tracks the autocrat’s rise, focusing on his family relationships, particularly with his wife, Mirjana, and ends with his trial in The Hague. It is interspersed with accounts from the Serbian actors of their own memories of life under Milosevic in the 1990s. It premiered on Tuesday to applause, tears, and a few walkouts.

“A lot of people cried yesterday,” said the show’s director, Nenad Todorovic, in a telephone interview on Wednesday. “A few of them left the show very angry. Half of them were delighted.”

“It’s a weird kind of musical,” he added, “not like your Broadway musicals.”

Most people living in Kosovo are ethnic Albanians, but the musical is being staged by Serbs in the Serbian-majority town of Gracanica. Milosevic’s shadow still looms large throughout the region, and tensions remain high. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Serbia and Serbian minority groups within Kosovo refuse to recognize it.

In a telephone interview from Gracanica, the show’s playwright, Jelena Bogavac, said she had hoped to write a play about ordinary daily life in Kosovo, but found that “the main character, the main role, in our lives in the ’90s was Slobodan Milosevic.” Milosevic was indicted on charges including genocide and torture for his campaigns against Kosovo Albanians and other groups. He was deposed in 2000.

Criticism of the play has focused on the lack of Albanian voices in the autobiographical accounts, as well as the choice of protagonist. Kujtim Gashi, Kosovo’s minister of culture, wrote in an email that artists should have freedom of expression, but that choosing to feature Milosevic and to hold the premiere of the show in Kosovo “may of course be irritating to the Kosovar society” that suffered from his crimes, which “were huge and had an impact not only to the Kosovo Albanians, but also to many other nations and countries in the former Yugoslavia.”

Mr. Todorovic said he had no intention of valorizing Milosevic: “If you ask me what I think about Milosevic, I don’t believe it will be for newspapers. Too many bad words.” But Milosevic has remained taboo for too long, he said. “We don’t speak about our problems. If we don’t have catharsis, we don’t have healing.” As it is, he said, “even today we live in the ’90s.”

A version of this article appears in print on March 8, 2018, on Page C3 of the New York edition with the headline: A Milosevic Musical Revives Pain in Kosovo. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe